1. Field of the Invention
This invention pertains to the field of equipment used for testing and sorting small electronic components. More particularly, the invention is an improvement of the invention disclosed and claimed in U.S. Pat. No. 5,568,870. In that patent, the metal-terminated ends of the miniature electronic ceramic components are loaded in isolated compartments, and each of their terminated ends contacted with a pair of single electrical probes. This invention permits each metal-terminated end of the miniature inductor chip to be simultaneously contacted with two pairs of independent electrical probes. In addition, this invention permits these miniature inductors to be loaded, tested and sorted at processing rates exceeding 60,000 parts per hour.
2. Description of the Prior Art
As we close out the Century, the electronic industry continues its ever speedier race to develop new, smaller and faster-working electronic products. Computers are becoming an increasingly used product in our daily lives. They are being made smaller, more powerful, and to perform more tasks than were ever imagined just a few years ago. While large computers performed mathematical calculations in the '70's and 80', smaller versions of them find increasingly diverse uses, today such as connecting many people through portable cellular telephones, controlling vehicular traffic flow, telling and monitoring time for everything from sleeping to cooking, and now even monitoring the real-time location of parents and children alike.
While more uses are being found for computers, developments come about only by shrinking computer components so that the overall product is more consumer friendly. Accordingly, there is constant pressure to reduce the size of electronic circuit components to allow computers and processors to be made smaller and smaller. As an example, the ageold inductor has shrunk from a cigarette-sized coil with wires extending from the ends thereof to a tiny ceramic device, far smaller than a grain of rice with metal terminations at the ends thereof. The metal terminations take the place of the end termination wires so that the inductor can be soldiered directly to minute parallel copper strips or pads formed on the surface of a circuit board. At the present time, these inductors have been reduced in size to a miniature device having overall dimensions of 0.040.times.0.024.times.0.024 inches. Forty-two of them can be set side-by-side within the length of one inch.
In addition to the pressure to make these inductors smaller, there is similar pressure to process, i.e., test and sort them faster. In processing these miniature inductors, it is important to contact each metallic terminated end of the inductor simultaneously with at least two conductors and also to accomplish this task quite rapidly and accurately so that the testing and handling time is reduced to a bare minimum. A reduction in processing time allows more such inductors to be processed on a single machine in a certain time-period thereby reducing capital expenditures necessary for testing equipment and labor costs involved in handling the testing itself. Rapid processing rates, for inductors requiring simultaneous contacting of the ends of the inductor with two pair of electrodes, have been almost impossible because of the difficulty in holding the inductor steady while the four independent conductors approach, contact, and withdraw from the terminated ends of the inductor.
The greatest problem in performing high-speed testing of such miniature parts is in handling them. As they get smaller, they become more difficult to handle and surface tension, static electricity, moisture on a person's hands, humidity, and ambient temperature begin to play an ever-increasing role in preventing smooth operation. In addition, the market is calling for faster handling of the inductors in order to maintain, or in some cases, drive down the cost of providing them to the industry. Competition is fierce and technical achievement is becoming paramount in maintaining market penetration.